Scores of families flocked to Brooklyn Heights on Saturday to kick-off the holiday season at a Scandinavian yuletide bash filled with Nordic food, drinks, and gifts that offered attendees a festive taste of the region, according to an event volunteer.

“Some of these special Christmas decorations are really cute and remind you immediately of Denmark,” said Helena Barton, a native Dane who moved to the United States last year and traveled from Connecticut to work at the Danish Christmas Fair. “Just seeing the crowds, the interest, and the excitement, I get nostalgic for Christmas in Scandinavia.”

Kitchen volunteers whipped up traditional holiday treats such as æbleskiver, spherical popover-like pastries, and gløgg, a type of mulled wine, for guests at the seamen’s church, while workers at Plymouth Church served open-faced sandwiches called smørrebrød.

And the food-filled fair was also a one-stop stocking-stuffer shop, according to one Dane who brought her youngsters along and said she’s been coming to forage for trinkets — many of which are otherwise only sold in Denmark — for 40 years.

“It’s the place in the tri-state area to get Christmas things from Denmark for the holidays,” said Anina Rossen, who traveled from faraway New Jersey to attend. “We bought some Danish chocolate, herring, Danish rye bread, and some Danish candy.”

Reach reporter Julianne Cuba at (718) 260–4577 or by e-mail at jcuba@cnglocal.com. Follow her on Twitter @julcuba.

Reasonable discourse

Jessica Smith says:

Thanks for the great post. Christmas is the ideal time of celebration, meeting the family members and enjoying the time with friends. But I would like to suggest, that's how differently, you can have the Christmas celebration. My sister believes in helping the needy people. So, at this Christmas, she had celebrated her Christmas with the mission humanitaire ( http://www.mission-humanitaire-afrique.org ), where they went to the orphanage to make gift the essential things to the orphans and make them happy.

Aug. 2, 4:17 am

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